Home Sweet Home
by Checkerboards
Summary: The sequel to 'Housemates', in which Jackie and the Riddler learn why copycats are dangerous, why heists are not spectator events, and why skipping dessert is always a good idea.
1. Going Home Again

Sometimes it's easier just to keep going. There's always that little glimmer of hope that okay, so maybe you're slogging through a hurricane with no boots and no coat, but at least you're not dressed up like a giant kite. Things could conceivably be worse, in other words, and they just might get that way if you wander away from what you've been doing.

Jackie was definitely considering the option to wander. It had been two days since Batman had invaded her home - _the Riddler's hideout_, she corrected herself firmly, and Eddie was nowhere to be found. Well, not that she'd been looking...not _really_...he was a grown man, after all, and he could take care of himself. There was no need to go around asking people if they'd seen him, as if he was a lost puppy.

But she had. She'd gathered up her courage and had crept down to the Iceberg to ask after him. Harley Quinn, the first one she'd asked, had given her an all-too-knowing look and a patronizing pat on the shoulder. "He'll come home when he wants ya, Query."

Okay, so maybe asking Harley was a bad idea, particularly since Harley was under the impression that she was Eddie's minion. And she couldn't exactly explain the real situation, not when she was still uncertain if she needed the protection of an alliance with Eddie to make sure she wouldn't end up on the wrong end of a popgun. (At any rate, she was fairly uncertain about what her position actually _was,_ so explanations would have to wait until she figured it out herself.)

After her opening statement, Harley delivered a very long and somewhat _too_ personal speech about the role of henchgirls and the vagaries of rogues. In her assertions that 'We're All Henchgirls Together', she innocently mentioned things like "If they push you out a window, they're just a little annoyed" and "That tattoo covering makeup works on bruises, too". Jackie's resolve not to ever, ever become a henchgirl had hardened into something resembling pure titanium. Not that she thought that Eddie would ever throw her out a window, but there was something about Harley's cheerful acceptance of her fate that disturbed her. "An' I know it gets lonely..._hey_!" she brightened. "We could hang out together while we wait for the bosses to come back!"

_Oh, hell_. "Oh, good," Jackie said faintly. "Where?"

"Well, Mistah J's in Arkham," Harley sighed, "so I can wait for him anywhere. But if Eddie comes back and finds you're not there..." She shook her head. "Yer not supposed ta leave until they say ya can, Q!" Harley said, hopping down from her barstool. "So we'll go ta your place."

Jackie had unwillingly acquiesced, thinking that she could surely handle a few hours of Harley's company. Harley had now been in the hideout for twenty-eight hours, and Jackie was seriously considering running away to her parents' house. _Walking_ away, if necessary. To Vermont. Harley was sweet, and nice, and cheerful - but she was all of these things in a magnified, caffeine-high way that made you daydream about tranquilizers after a mere half-hour in her presence. The daydreams quickly transformed to thoughts about duct tape in handy mouth-sized squares when Harley shifted the conversation to the Joker (which she did approximately every ninety seconds).

"An' Puddin's just _gorgeous_," Harley said. Jackie's heart started to beat a little faster with apprehension. She was fairly certain she didn't want to hear the next sentence. "He's so pretty..._all over_..." Harley sighed dreamily.

Oh, yes, she _really_ didn't want to hear this. How could she politely stick her fingers in her ears and shout _la la la la la_? "Uh, Harley..." she said hesitantly.

"He's got the nicest shoulders...and such a pretty back..." She giggled naughtily. "An' he's got the cutest little tu-"

"_Harley_!" Jackie said hastily. "You think he's cute. I get it already."

"What's the matter? Don't you think he's cute?" Harley asked, cocking her head to one side.

Jackie paused, considering her answer carefully. If she went with her gut answer - _oh god no_ - it was likely to earn her Harley's wrath. (She still winced whenever she remembered the Joker-Vs-Matt Damon debacle that had taken place in the convenience store on the way home when she'd suggested adding a People magazine to the stack of glossy paper towering in Harley's arms. Harley had drawn more than a few stares when she'd screeched about that _rag_ that had the _nerve_ to say that anyone was sexier than the Joker.) But if she said he _was_ cute, would Harley take it as a territorial threat? "He's certainly...unusual," Jackie finally said.

"Yeah, there's no one like Mistah J," Harley said wistfully.

_Thank the heavens for that_, Jackie thought fervently. She looked around for something - anything - to talk about other than the Joker. She found what she was looking for on the couch next to her: the remote control to the television. Under pretense of shifting position, she leaned hard on the power button and the television flickered on.

"...the "world" of Azeroth, where heroes like Leeroy Jenkins do battle," Alex Trebek read in his pleasant voice.

"Booo-ring," Harley shot back.

Jackie tossed her the remote. "Is there anything better on?"

Harley flipped channels with practiced skill. "Nope-dullsville-yawn-EEEEEEE!" she squealed, dropping the remote in her excitement. "The Acromegliacs!"

"I used to watch this all the time when I was a kid!" Jackie lied excitedly.

"Great!"

And so they watched, hour after mind-numbing hour. The Acromegliacs DVDs were being released, so the cartoon channel was playing a marathon of all of the best episodes. After three hours of cartoon gibberish, Jackie was starting to think that maybe discussing the Joker's finer attributes wasn't all _that_ bad.

And then the door slammed open to reveal a furious man with a paper-pale face. _I didn't mean it_, Jackie protested mentally as he stormed inside.

* * *

The best way to hide is always in plain sight. In fact, if you can get people to actively ignore you, it can be the most effective strategy for staying under the radar. If they don't want to see you, they won't. 

Eddie had been stranded across town in a satellite lair for the past two days. Well, _stranded_ was probably too strong a word. In theory, he could have left at any time. All it would have taken to get back to Jackie was a stroll across the city dressed in his costume in broad daylight with cops everywhere. Simple, right?

Well, Eddie didn't feel like being chased by anyone. He'd had enough of that recently. And so he decided to hide in plain sight all the way home. Fortunately, this was the lair that had previously housed his most indecisive Quiz to date, the one that redid her costume every time they went out on a heist. He was certain he could cobble something together out of the mess.

And now he was walking along the street, crammed into an old pair of black stretch pants and his own black shirt, face coated liberally with greasepaint. An old, battered top hat rested in one hand. He hoped no one could see the green question marks that he'd colored over with a black marker.

A woman on a cigarette break was staring at him. He pranced up to her and mimed taking a long drag on an imaginary cigar, twiddling it in his fingers and leering at her like Groucho Marx. She frowned at him and flicked her cigarette to the pavement before retreating inside, slamming the door in his face.

Eddie continued to mime his way across town. He was not exactly happy about the situation - it was rather demeaning, after all - but it was better than Arkham. Most things were. He sidled into a shopping plaza and carefully walked against the wind around the corner. A police station squatted in the middle of the row of buildings.

Heart pounding wildly, Eddie mimed his way past it. He could have avoided it, true, but this was the shortest way home and the greasepaint was really starting to itch. An off-duty cop was sitting on the steps, eating a sandwich. Eddie edged around him. The cop ignored him.

Something green flashed in the corner of his eye. Eddie turned to see what it was. The top hat's brim began to resemble an accordion as his fingers unthinkingly crushed it.

On a billboard, in letters three feet high, the words "The last pig needs the wolf" beamed at the police station surrounded with green question marks. His symbol. His colors! His _theme_!

"Yeah, we've been getting a lot of those recently," the cop remarked from his spot on the stairs, noticing Eddie's stunned gape at the sign. "I think the Riddler's finally gone off the deep end." The cop snorted into his sandwich. "Not that he had all that much on the ball to begin with."

Eddie mentally marked those comments down in his Revenge Pending file and continued to glare at the sign. That was it. He'd send out a _real_ riddle, show this impostor how it was done, and he'd damn well show the world that the Riddler was not in the habit of sending out_ gibberish_ like this!

To hell with camouflage. Eddie stormed home, ignoring everyone in his path. If they didn't get out of his way, he smacked into them and shoved them aside. There was no room for anything else in his mind but the white-hot rage at the impostor besmirching his name.

He stomped into the lair. The television giggled maniacally at him. He picked up the nearest thing to hand - a solid bronze question mark the size of a shoe - and hurled it through the screen. It fizzled and died.

"Rough day?" Harley Quinn asked calmly from her spot on his sofa.

"Yes," the Riddler growled, stamping into his bedroom and slamming the door.

"What happened?" Jackie asked in a whisper.

Harley shrugged. "He's your boss. You tell me."

The remains of the television slowly started to glow with orange light. Harley absently dug in her bag, extracted a little red cylinder, and extinguished the fire.

"You carry a _fire extinguisher_?" Jackie asked.

"It comes in handy." Harley waved toward the fizzing remains of the television. "Puddin' does that instead of changin' channels some days. We go through a lot of TVs."

Eddie, now dressed in his own clothes once again, slammed out of his bedroom and slammed into the bathroom. The door bounced open. He slammed it again. It rattled off of its hinges and fell with a crash to the floor. He glared at it as if it was the source of all his troubles and kicked it. Ignoring the women in the other room, he set to trying to scrape the greasepaint off.

He merely succeeded in swirling it around his face. He swore in one long uninterrupted river of sound as he fought with the wretched stuff.

A hand holding a canister labeled 'Makeup Remover' appeared tentatively around the doorway. He snatched it up and began smearing it all over his face.

Jackie tiptoed back to the living room. "He'd probably thank you if he wasn't so, um...angry. Is there anything you _don't_ have in that bag?"

Harley grinned as she stood up. "Fish," she said. "I _hate_ fish. Keep the makeup stuff, I've got plenty," she said, making her way toward the door.

Jackie panicked. "You're not going to leave me alone with him, are you?" she said.

"They get mad, Q. Just stay outta his way till he calms down," Harley advised. "Oh, an' if you've got bandages, you might wanna keep 'em handy. Bye!" And with that disturbing advice, Harley skipped back out onto the road.

Bandages. Yeah. Jackie glanced nervously at the bathroom. The Riddler was almost done de-miming himself. Vermont was sounding really good right now...

* * *

After his face was free of that disgusting makeup, Eddie took a moment to grip the sink firmly and calm down. There was an impostor. There had been others, there would be more. Every shmuck in the world thought he could be the Riddler, given half a chance. 

He was home. He could get his notebook, think of some really _superb_ riddles, and go out and paint the town green. And if the impostor happened to show up, _well_, he knew how to deal with _them_.

His stomach reminded him that he hadn't really eaten anything since the night Batman had shown up. Batman...now there was a person he shouldn't think about if he was trying to calm down. He kicked the remains of the door aside with one foot and headed for the kitchen.

A half-melted dish of ice cream - and by _dish_, he realized that he meant _mixing bowl_ - lay on the countertop along with a spray bottle of whipped cream and an economy-sized jug of chocolate syrup. Splatters of brown and white covered all the available space on the countertop and the bottom third of the wall. _Harley Quinn was here_, he snorted.

He pulled open a cupboard. Harley had been here, too - either that, or Jackie had let a horde of ravenous wolves with a jones for snack cakes into the kitchen. He sighed, snatched up a granola bar, and unwrapped it. It wouldn't be much, but it would be enough to get rid of that uneasy spinning feeling in his midsection.

Licking sticky fingers, he headed back into the living room. Jackie was tentatively poking at a bit of crinkly shattered glass that used to be part of the television screen. He cleared his throat.

Jackie whipped around to face him. "Oh! H-hi," she stammered.

"Harley's gone?" he asked.

"Yeah, she left while you were...um...in the bathroom," Jackie said uneasily. "What happened?"

"Oh, the copycat left another riddle - if you can _call_ it that - on a billboard in front of the police station," Eddie grumbled. "But I'll show him. That riddle for the Impossibottle heist is going to blow that nonsense out of the water." He glanced around for his notebook full of ideas. There were lots of things in the room - Harley had apparently cleaned the nearest convenience store out of magazines, DVDs and ice cream - but there was no little notebook. He checked the couch pocket. It was empty. "Have you seen my notebook?" he asked.

Jackie bit her lip. "Um..." she said.

Eddie frowned. "Um" was not a good response. "Um" indicated that something unwanted had happened, and since Harley Quinn had been here, he had a sneaking suspicion of what that might be. "What happened to it?" He folded his arms, expecting one of a variety of excuses. Had it ended up in a bowl of melted ice cream? Had it been eaten by a hyena?

"It, um...it..." Jackie mumbled. "Bamatooit."

"What?"

"Batman. He, uh, took it with him," Jackie stammered, edging behind the arm of the couch.

"_What_?" Eddie bellowed. Jackie instinctively hit the floor and slammed her eyes shut.

Eddie didn't notice. All that work - all those _brilliant_ riddles - useless! How _dare_ the Batman steal his notebook! It was practically a second brain! He'd had all sorts of potential targets in there, half-riddled, and now he couldn't use _any_ of them!

Anger management was generally not a skill possessed by the rogues. This would go some way toward explaining why, instead of merely swearing or threatening revenge, Eddie did both while simultaneously trying to put his fist through the end table. The fact that it was the Riddler and not Bane beating up on the furniture would explain why the table stayed intact while his hand made a sad little snapping noise.

The ratio of curse words increased. He held his hand up, flexing his fingers and making sure nothing was damaged. The sound must have just been a knuckle cracking. Temporarily cheered by the fact that he hadn't broken his own hand, the Riddler looked around for Jackie.

All that was visible was a little quivering semicircle of hair peeping over the far arm of the couch. Oh. Maybe he had gone a little _too_ far when he'd threatened to hand Batman his own kidneys. And hanging around Harley had probably given her exactly the wrong idea about what would happen when he got angry.

He silently joined her behind the couch and knelt down next to her, awkwardly reaching out a hand to pat her on the back. She yelped and scooted toward the wreck of the television. When she was a safe distance away, she opened one slitted eye to see Eddie looking quizzically back at her. One hand was still extended as if he was feeding imaginary pigeons. "You okay?"

"Are _you_?" she asked timidly. "You looked like you were going to...well, Harley said..."

Eddie rolled his eyes. "Harley tends to compare everyone to the Joker."

"Yeah. I noticed."

"Well, I'm not the Joker. I'm not going to hurt you," he spelled out as she raised an unconvinced eyebrow. "I don't do that kind of thing."

The eyebrow remained firmly raised. "So you're not planning on beating anyone to death with their own leg tonight then?"

"Not unless _you're_ the one that's been planting these riddles all over town."

"Of course I haven't!" she said, somewhat offended.

"I know, I know," Eddie sighed, leaning against the couch. "Someone is, though, and I've got to get rid of them. I've got to do something_ now_. Soon. This can't go on." He saw a newspaper atop the pile of magazines - Harley must have purchased it for the comics section - and dug frantically to the untouched Society pages.

"There," he said, satisfied, pointing at a certain article. "That one."

"You're sure you want to do this?" Jackie said hesitantly.

"Positive. It'll be fun," he said. A thought brightened his features. "You should come along!"

"No! I mean, I don't want to do anything, you know, _illegal_," Jackie sputtered.

"You don't have to. No one will know you're there." He grinned at her. "C'mon, live a little. It'll be something to write home about."

Jackie, still thinking of the shattered television and the broken door, said "Well...okay."

It would be a decision that she would remember for the rest of her life.

* * *

Four nights later, Batman and Robin landed on the roof of the police station to find Commissioner Gordon glaring at a bright green envelope. Batman slit it open and scanned the little card inside. "This one's from him," he graveled, passing it to Gordon. 

The Commissioner squinted at Eddie's careful copperplate handwriting. "A series of notes that are written and bowed, Here you will find me: aghast on the road. The ending of lives in a Lydian mode, Crimson fatalities summoning toads."

Gordon shook his head and handed the note back to Batman. "He's all yours."

(_to be continued_)

* * *

_Author's Note: I'm quite proud of my riddle, even if it is a little obvious. (Or is it?) The Acromegliacs are from Harley and Ivy #3. Leeroy Jenkins is from the World of Warcraft (and yes, that was an actual answer on an episode of Jeopardy). _

_You can blame the whole Eddie-plays-dress-up idea on 'Death in Slow Motion'/'The Riddler's False Notion'. Very few things are cuter than the Riddler in a fabulous fake mustache. _


	2. Shocking Behavior

Sometimes a heist called for henchgirls. When the Riddler alone entered a building, the guards' thought processes were fairly straightforward: green-question marks-Riddler-shoot him! But when there were girls around, the thought process got a little muddied: green-question marks-wow, look at those _legs_-and that rack's not bad either-oh, shit, now there's a gun aimed at my heart.

Likewise, there were times when a heist called for hench_men_- stolid, dependable types with monosyllabic vocabularies and bad haircuts. This was one of those times.

"And you'll wait until I get up on the stage, right?" the Riddler said as he wrestled with a long, red velvet cloak. "And then what do you do?"

The driver grinned. "We wait till yous got all the attention an' we take the cash an' go quick an' quiet out the doors."

"Perfect. Great," Eddie said, muffled by yards of velvet. His head popped out of the swathe of cloth like a Whack-a-Mole. "And you've got your costumes?"

The two henchmen, who had been crammed into tuxedos, gestured at the animal masks that matched the ones worn by the catering crew. The guests would assume they were caterers, and the caterers would assume they were guests with unfortunately similar costume choices.

Eddie grinned madly and pulled the mask down to cover his face. "Then let's knock 'em dead."

* * *

Jackie hesitantly nipped a glass of champagne from a passing tray. She'd never been to a party like this before. Gotham's richest socialites swirled around her in a rainbow of colors. Animal-headed waiters proffered trays of drinks and snacks while a little string quartet wafted one of Bach's compositions into the air. 

To be honest, she wasn't quite sure why she'd come. Well, she hadn't wanted to disappoint Eddie, particularly since she knew how much he loved showing off...she sighed. She didn't want anyone to get hurt, including Eddie, but he was a rogue. He was going to get hurt sooner or later. Maybe after tonight she'd leave. She had enough money to stay in a hotel for a while, after all, and she was sure she could find another place to live eventually. Maybe Batman would catch him and she could sneak away while he was in Arkham.

Or maybe she'd get cold feet again at the thought of letting down the closest thing she had to a friend in this city. She drained her glass. No. She'd make new friends. Somehow. Maybe. Well, she'd lived without them for quite a while, she could do it again. Not that she wanted to, but she _could_...if she wanted to, which she didn't. Dammit...She snagged another passing glass of champagne.

The Gotham Opera House's Masquerade Ball was an infrequently held event. Critics had opined that perhaps having a costumed ball attended by Gotham's elite was a stupid, stupid idea unless they _wanted_ to attract rogues. But the anniversary of the release of 'Phantom of the Opera' combined with the manager's arrogant claim that no rogue would_ dare_ to rob _his_ party meant that once again the Opera's ballroom had been transformed into a nineteenth-century salon.

Jackie wrinkled her nose underneath her black domino mask as she passed by the buffet. Goose livers, fish eggs - disgusting. Maybe food fashion trends were set by middle-classers who secretly giggled at the thought of the rich eating bits of muck that no self-respecting person would normally touch. Her glass was empty. Well, at least the champagne was good...and another glass certainly couldn't hurt...

A man in a red velvet cloak thumped hard into her back. "Scuse me," he belched, sliding his skull mask off to take a closer look at her. "I don't reckonize you..."

"That's the point of masks," she said, backing away. She didn't know who this jerk was, but she'd played Avoid the Drunk at office parties before and she wasn't keen to do it again. _Whump_! Another man in a red velvet cloak and a skull mask.

"Hwatch hwhere you're going, gel," a snooty English voice chimed.

"Sorry," she muttered.

"Can I have your attention?" a bright young man on the stage said, clapping his hands eagerly like a schoolteacher faced with a horde of first-graders. "Thank you, thank you. Thank you all for attending the Opera's Masquerade Ball! Our restoration fund is overflowing, thanks to your generosity!" He waved at a stack of treasure trunks in the back, the top two of which were stuffed with crisp green bills. "Now, as part of our little tradition here, I'd like to ask all the Red Deaths to come to the stage for a little group picture. Come on, gentlemen, your moment of glory awaits!"

Jackie peered at the tableau of Deaths. One of them had to be Eddie. But that one was too fat...too short...too dark...ah, now _that_ one looked promising. A feather in his grand hat stuck up in an unmistakable question mark.

The pictures were taken and the Deaths descended back off of the stage, all except the question-feathered one, who lounged against the scenery and cocked his head quizzically at the host. "Sir, you may return to the party," the host informed him, still using his _I'm talking to the whole room_ voice.

The Red Death held up a finger and fumbled theatrically at his neck. "And the unmasking isn't until _midnight_!" the host hissed.

The Death yanked on a single thread. In one smooth motion, the cloak and the fancy red suit fell in shreds on the floor, uncovering Eddie's best green suit. Eddie popped the mask off and handed it to the stunned host. "Hello, Gotham!" he cried happily, waving at the stunned cameramen in the front row. "_Riddle me this_!"

"Sir, really, this is in poor taste-" the host began, thinking it was a joke.

With a flourish, Eddie produced a question-mark-covered gun from an inside pocket. "No, that buffet was in poor taste," he informed the quivering host. The gun's muzzle curlicued through the air and ended up aimed right between the host's eyes. "_This_ is much better." He looked into the crowded hall and winked.

Jackie, who really didn't want to be publicly winked at during a heist, ducked behind a nearby billionaire. But apparently she wasn't the only one who wanted to hide, because the billionaire almost ran her over as he made his way toward the nearest exit. _Coward. _Jackie settled for hiding behind another very handy glass of champagne that was practically _begging_ to be consumed.

Eddie was strutting up and down along the stage, somehow managing to keep the gun squarely pointed at the pop-eyed host as he talked to the crowd. "...which reminds me," he smiled, directing his remark to a young reporter in the front row. "When is a party like a-"

The skylight clattered open and two men trailing long black capes thumped hard into a bare patch of floor. "Party crashers," Eddie sneered at Batman and Robin as they unfolded themselves. "Don't you hate it when uninvited guests just drop in?" he asked the host, who didn't dare answer. "We'd better give them what they came for...Look up, Batman!" Eddie cried tauntingly. "There's more than one way to bring the house down!"

As one, every eye in the room was raised to the ceiling. A cluster of barrels hung there, wound round with a web of wires and computer parts. A deadly-looking little silver scorpion was perched on top of a timer. Batman immediately launched himself toward the ceiling. "He hops!" Eddie gloated. "And he hops jolly high!"

A bomb? A _bomb_? Jackie glared at Eddie as he smirked upward at the Batman. He'd said she would be safe! He didn't say anything about a bomb! She was definitely going to have some things to say to him when they got home. Well, _if_ they got home. If _he_ got home, anyway.

She lurched unexpectedly to the side as Robin shouldered her out of the way. Champagne ran in a bubbly little stream down her silk glove. Apparently rudeness wasn't just a Batman thing.

Eddie beamed smugly down at Robin as he forced his way through the crowd. "I had rather hoped that you would come," he remarked as Robin sidestepped a burly cameraman. "And now my wish comes true. You have truly made my night!"

Robin leapt to the stage, cape flaring dramatically. "Let him go, Riddler," he snapped.

Eddie appeared to consider it for a moment, thoughtfully rubbing his chin with his free hand. "No," he said finally. One gloved thumb caressed the rear sight of the gun. The host whimpered.

"I said-" A batarang whipped through the air and knocked the gun right out of Eddie's hand. "Let him _go_!"

_Oh, let him go, Eddie_, Jackie thought from her spot in the crowd._ Just...just go quietly, don't make him hurt you_!

Eddie sulkily shoved his hands into his jacket pockets. Then, with an oddly satisfied smile on his face, he drew his empty hands back out and shrugged. "Of all the nights to forget my backup gun," he grinned.

The host took the opportunity to slither back into the audience as Robin narrowed suspicious eyes at the Riddler. From above, there was a muffled grunt and a clank as a bit of the bomb was manhandled aside. "Whatever you think you're doing, stop it," Robin ordered.

Eddie's eyes twinkled. "Fine." He raised his hands to the level of his eyes, framing his face with spread fingers. "I surrender!"

Robin, from long experience with Eddie and his counterparts, knew better. The Riddler did not surrender. The Riddler _never_ surrendered unless he had something up his sleeve. Well, Robin knew how to deal with that. With a flying kick, he knocked him to the ground. "I give in?" Eddie suggested as Robin landed a left hook on his cheek. "Uncle?" he asked in a grunt as Robin kicked him in the ribs.

The champagne glass slipped out of Jackie's hand and hit the floor as she gaped in astonished anger at the rather one-sided fight on the stage. He'd _surrendered_! They weren't supposed to beat him up if he gave in! What kind of a hero would hit an unarmed prisoner? Robin's foot connected with Eddie's midriff again, knocking him hard onto the ground. "Bravo, monsieur," Eddie wheezed. A trickle of blood ran down his chin.

This was ridiculous! Jackie cleared a passage to the stage using her elbows and the very pointed heels on her shoes. She had to stop Robin somehow. Eddie wasn't even trying to stand up anymore, he was just very slowly crawling to the right side of the stage.

Jackie caught up with the duo just as Robin yanked Eddie aloft by his collar. Robin's left arm went back, ready to land yet another punch on Eddie's face -

And Jackie shoved Robin as hard as she could away from the battered Riddler. She'd meant to separate them, maybe long enough to explain that he didn't _need_ to hit Eddie or that maybe his time would be better spent using handcuffs instead of fisticuffs.

Instead, Robin skidded wildly to the right side of the stage. There was an odd clicking noise as his foot clipped a taut wire. And then there was nothing but the harsh metallic sounds of an electrified question-mark-shaped puzzle trap sailing down from the flyloft and snapping shut on the young vigilante. Sparks flew as wires made contact with skin. "B-b-b-b-b-b," Robin gibbered.

It would be prudent at this point to examine the mental condition of the three people gathered on the stage. All three were shocked.

Robin, of course, was shocked in that plebeian, ordinary way - with 50,000 pulsing volts of electricity applied directly to his nervous system via every inch of exposed skin.

Jackie was shocked in a slightly more profound way. She hadn't known there was a death-trap there. If she'd known, she certainly wouldn't have thrown anyone into it! She began to feel that horrible, glowy flush of embarrassment burning out of her skin - the one that always accompanied the voice howling _Look what you did now_! in the back of her brain.

And the Riddler was shocked in a pleasantly surprised way. He'd meant to shove Robin into the trap himself once he could lure him over to that side of the stage, but this was _much_ better. He glanced into the back of the room. The boys had left with the cash already, and Batman was busy now trying to extract Robin from the trap. Eddie grabbed the unresisting Jackie around the waist and dragged her to center stage as Batman began to rip wires out of the trap. "Exit, stage center," he beamed down at her. He triumphantly pulled a little remote control out of his pocket - presumably the one that had armed the deathtrap - and pressed a little green button. The floor beneath their feet disappeared.

"EEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!" she shrieked as they plummeted downward. With a soft _whump_ing noise, they landed on a gigantic pile of pillows and other soft stage dressing. She'd barely grown accustomed to the idea that they weren't plummeting to their deaths when Eddie yanked her up by the arm and propelled her into the dusty, dark maze of scenery stored beneath the little stage.

"That was _fantastic_!" he said, ducking and weaving around a giant fake tree. "How did you know to do that? That was incredible!"

"I...I didn't mean to..." Jackie stammered.

Eddie, consumed with glee, didn't hear her. "Did you see his _face_ when he tripped over that wire?"

"Yeah," Jackie muttered as the Riddler pulled her out of a dingy stage door. She had a feeling she'd remember that face for a _long_ time. A van idled noisily in the street, one door flung open. Two men in animal masks sat lumpishly in the front seats.

The Riddler shoved Jackie into the van and leaped in after her, slamming the door with a yip of utter delight. "Go! Go!" he urged the driver, who slammed his foot to the floor and sent them rocketing into the night.

Jackie stared helplessly down at her lacy, ruffled dress as Eddie directed the van toward a satellite hideout.

What had she _done_?

(_to be continued_)

* * *

_Author's Note: Oh, Jackie. 'Whoops' doesn't even _begin_ to cover it. _

_Gaston Leroux wrote the Phantom of the Opera. Andrew Lloyd Weber may have had something to do with it as well, with a little help from Pink Floyd and Puccini._

_(Also, I think I deserve a cookie for that riddle. I managed to squeeze in the rosy days at Mazenderan cleverly disguised as a musical clue (the Lydian mode is a musical term for a certain diatonic scale, and Lydia is a region conveniently located in Persia, where they keep the Punjab lassos) and the author's name (aghast on the road a-Gaston Leroux/La rue/the road). _


	3. Don Juan Triumphant, Sorta

Everyone makes mistakes. No matter who it is, no matter how important or famous or intelligent, they have made at _least_ one mistake that sends cringes of embarrassment up their spine.

However, most people are lucky enough not to make their mistakes in front of a camera crew. Most people, in fact, are never put into a situation where a bit of empty stage could dramatically transform into a deathtrap, nor are they generally drunk and angry enough to lay hands on one of Gotham's vigilantes and unknowingly propel them directly into it.

Unfortunately for her, Jackie Baker was not most people. The Riddler had spent the entire ride to the lair gleefully chattering about the heist and - it had to be said - _squealing_ about Robin's introduction into the deathtrap. It was too dark for him to see the look of horrified shame that etched its way a little deeper into Jackie's face every time he even said the word Robin.

The van finally stopped outside an abandoned shop. A dinged-up sign over the entryway read "Wak-o T-ys". Eddie scrambled out of the backseat, tossing out orders before his shoes hit the pavement. "Get the boxes inside, and then you can go home."  
"What about our shares?" one of the henchmen asked suspiciously.

"We'll take care of that inside," Eddie dismissed. The two burly men each seized a trunk out of the back of the van and manhandled them inside. Eddie watched them go, then offered a grandly flourished hand to help Jackie out of the van. After a few seconds, he felt a bit silly and put his hand back down. "You can get out of the van now," he hinted. "We're home." She stayed firmly in her seat. He could just barely see her silhouette in the shadows. "Jackie?" he asked.

"Boss, it's in," one of the men said, poking his head out of the doorway.

"In a minute, in a minute," Eddie said. "Jackie, are you okay?"

"Fine," she whispered. "One minute."

The adrenaline was still roaring through Eddie's system, obliterating any thoughts that anything might be wrong. "Okay, come in when you're ready," he smiled, trotting inside to split the cash.

It didn't take long, particularly since Eddie generously added a bit to each of their shares for doing such a marvelous job. When they had gone, he clicked the little television on to the nightly news and settled down to watch.

He heard the door creak open and the soft click-click of high heels on the hardwood floor. "You're just in time," he beamed, not looking toward the doorway. "We'll be on when the credits stop rolling."

They didn't have to wait long. The pretty blonde newsreader turned to the camera with a serious look on her face. "Good evening. This evening, the Gotham Opera House was the target of yet another theft by Edward Nygma, otherwise known as 'the Riddler'." The screen filled with a side-by-side comparison of one of Eddie's mug shots and a picture of him wrapped in a question-mark-speckled unitard and standing triumphantly in front of a blown-open bank vault.

"I wish they'd update their pictures," Eddie grumbled. He hadn't worn spandex in _years_.

The screen filled with jittery footage from one of the cameras that had been in the front row. "Batman and Robin appeared on the scene, but were thwarted by an unknown henchgirl, seen here throwing Robin into what appears to be an electricity-based trap."

Zzzzzzzap! went the little televised vigilante. Batman swung down and yanked a bit of it apart, breaking the current and stopping the electrocution. Eddie sighed. Really, it only would have taken a few extra minutes to solve the puzzle as it was _meant_ to be solved instead of just destroying it. "After freeing his associate, the Batman went on to disarm a bomb that had been attached to the ceiling. The Riddler and his accomplice got away with over seventy-five thousand dollars that was originally intended to go toward the restoration of the Opera House. Police report that-" A piece of paper was shoved into view. The newsreader plucked it from the unseen hand, scanned it, and then said "The girl has been identified as Jacqueline Baker. If you have any information on the whereabouts of either Ms. Baker or Edward Nygma, please contact the Gotham Police Department at once. In related news, Jervis Tetch, known as the Mad Hatter, was apprehended today at-"

_Click_. "Top billing," Eddie mused happily, tossing the remote aside. "Not bad, not bad at all." Still grinning, he leaned back comfortably in his seat. "Did you have a good time, Jac...Jackie?"

Jackie didn't look like she'd had a good time. She looked like she'd been told that soon she was going to be devoured slowly from the feet up by sharks. "A good time?" she said feebly. "A good..._time_?"

"Well, yes! I mean...they didn't hurt you, did they?" Eddie said, leaping to his feet. If Robin had...if _Batman_ had...well, there was probably still time to go back and do something inventive involving the remains of his deathtrap and those conveniently wired Batsuits...

"N-no...they didn't..." And then, unceremoniously, Jackie folded to the floor and started crying in huge, gulping sobs.

Well, if Batman and his brat hadn't hurt her, then what was the problem? "Then what's wrong?" he asked.

Jackie looked up at him with tear-filled eyes. Then, with a very unladylike sniff, she tore her high heel off and hurled it at him. The sharp pointed toe jabbed hard into his cheek. "Hey," he protested, "what was that for?"

"What was that for?" Jackie mimicked with rising anger in her voice. She was starting to get that _let's-disassemble-the-Riddler_ look on her face. He was suddenly very glad that he didn't have a fire extinguisher laying around anywhere in this lair. "You could have _told_ me there was a...a..." She waved her hands in the shape of giant curving bars of metal.

"Deathtrap?" Eddie suggested.

"Yeah," she growled. "A _deathtrap_. Why didn't you _tell_ me?"

"You didn't want to know!" he protested. "You said _don't tell me, that way I won't know what you're going to do _- and anyway, you would have been safe regardless!"

"And that's another thing," Jackie growled. "You had a bomb on the ceiling! I could have been _killed_!"

"Oh, you would not," he said dismissively.

"Oh? What, was it only rigged to kill Batman?"

"No, it wasn't rigged to kill _anyone_. It was the scorpion." She glared at him. "From the book? The grasshopper's the one that would have blown the place up!"

"Oh, fabulous. So what does the scorpion do?"

"It would have turned on the sprinklers."

"That's really villainous, Eddie. _Sprinklers_," she snorted, obviously not believing him. "What was your cunning plan in case that failed? A cymbal monkey that played a menacing tune?"

"It was a _decoy_! Look, the whole point was to distract the Batman until the money was safely out the door!"

"Some distraction!" Jackie shouted. "I didn't think you were going to try and _kill_ people!"

"I didn't kill anyone!" he protested. "Batman and his kids get out of traps like that _all the time-_"

"Then why did you bother having it there?" she snarled.

"To give us time to get away!"

"Us?" She got to her feet and limped over to him half-shod. "There is no _us_, pal! In case you didn't notice, I'm not one of your henchgirls!"

Now_ there_ was an interesting point. He regarded her mildly. "Aren't you?" he said calmly.

"_No_!" Jackie shrieked.

"You'll find that hard to prove, particularly to the Batman," Eddie said. "Masked women who _aren't_ my henchgirls typically do not rush to my rescue."

She ripped the mask off and stomped on it. "To hell with you," she snarled. She retrieved her other shoe, jammed it on her foot, and threw open the door.

"And where will you go?" Eddie asked.

She turned and glared at him. "Anywhere but here, that's for damn sure." She turned away and continued out into the street.

"Consider this," Eddie pointed out, following her as far as the doorway. "The police know who you are and what you look like. How far do you think you'll make it dressed like that, particularly when the Batman and his associates will be combing the streets for the two of us?"

She glared at him again. "How long do you think they'll keep me once I turn _you_ in?"

He ignored the threat. "Oh, I believe the standard sentence for attempted murder is up to twenty-five years in jail, though most people get out after only ten." Her face turned sickly green in the bright white streetlight. Eddie nonchalantly leaned against the doorframe. "Of course, I've heard that the women's accommodations in Blackgate aren't _too_ terrible..."

"But I didn't _mean_ to do it!" she wailed.

He shrugged. "You know it. I know it. But no one else will ever believe it, particularly when they find out where you've been staying for the past few weeks."

"So what do you suggest?"

"Well, it's either ten years in Blackgate..." His mouth quirked into a smile. "Or you can stay with me."

A siren wailed mournfully somewhere in the distance. Jackie whirled like a gazelle hearing a twig snap and regarded the empty street with wide eyes. Eddie pointedly cleared his throat and stepped back into the lair. "Are you coming?" he inquired.

"For now, yes," she snapped, sailing through the doorway with the shreds of her dignity wrapped around her like a cloak.

* * *

Jackie paced angrily around the tiny henchgirl's room. 

This lair was very different than the first one. That one was a showpiece crammed with question-marked decorations of every sort. This one was merely a gutted-out old toy store that was barely big enough to qualify as an efficiency apartment. The Riddler had taken over the stockroom as his own bedroom, leaving the tiny little office to be used for whatever henchgirls he had on hand at the moment.

Jackie swore as she stubbed her toe again on the little twin bed. The_ arrogant_ little _bastard_! How _dare_ he get her into this! He'd manipulated her into attacking Robin just so he could keep her around as a henchgirl! That _bastard_!

And the beauty of it was that it was such a believable lie. It was so believable, in fact, that Jackie was having a hard time _not_ believing it. It was so much easier to point at Eddie and say "It's all _his_ fault." Of course! He was the one that manipulated _her_. If he'd never robbed the Opera House, she wouldn't be in this mess!

_And if you'd had the courage to leave, you wouldn't have your name on an arrest warrant_, a little voice in the back of her mind whispered. No! No, this was _not_ her fault!

...Yes it was. Jackie kicked the bedpost, hard, and threw herself down on the well-worn blanket. It _was_ her fault. If she had only left...if she hadn't gone to the heist...if she hadn't gotten drunk off of the champagne...If, if, if.

What the hell was she supposed to do now? She'd never done anything illegal - well, okay, she'd had a parking ticket or two, but that was_ hardly_ the same thing - and the constrictions of her situation were hemming her in like prison walls.

Oooh, now _there_ was a metaphor she should avoid. She gathered a frilly little pillow into her lap and played with the fraying edges of it as she thought. She could try to go home to her parents...if the cops wouldn't have already started waiting for her there. And if the cops didn't catch her on her way out of town. And if she could even _find_ a way out of town - she had no ID and no way to get at her money in the bank without it, which meant that public transportation was right out. And if Batman didn't swoop down and break her legs.

A thread snapped in her hands. Batman was certain to be furious with her. Look at how angry he'd been when he thought Eddie was leaving harmlessly stupid riddles all over town! She had a feeling that kicking Robin into a deathtrap was just about the perfect way to earn a spot on his List of People to Put in the Hospital.

Well, Eddie had survived the Bats. She wound the little thread around her finger as tightly as she could. Eddie knew how to deal with the Bats - well, not _stunningly_ so, given that his last plan involved letting them beat him half-senseless, but still, he _did_ have a plan - and maybe he'd be able to keep her safe until she could convince the cops that she didn't mean to do it.

If she could convince them. If the Batman didn't show up and break her legs first.

She appeared to have two options: give herself up and hope for mercy _now_, or run like hell and hope for mercy _later_. And of the two, the option that allowed her some time to think (and hopefully, some time with unbroken legs) was definitely looking a little shinier.

Besides, Eddie was good at hiding and running, skills that she definitely needed in the near future. He had connections, he had resources - hell, he was friends with Two-Face, who used to be a lawyer, right? So at least she could maybe weasel some free legal advice out of the situation. Maybe she could get through this without going to jail.

She slapped a weary hand over her face and sighed. It was just another pretty lie. She was totally, completely, utterly banjaxed. Criminals went to jail, and now she was a criminal. Jail was practically a certainty.

She needed a drink. Not an alcoholic one - those had gotten her in _enough_ trouble recently. No, she simply needed something liquid to wash away that dry, tight feeling of utter doom in her esophagus.

Barefoot, still in her lacy dress, she crept out of the little office and looked around. There was no sound from the Riddler's room. Maybe he'd be asleep by now. She eased her door shut and padded into the kitchen.

The Riddler, back to the door, was wrestling with a frozen loaf of sliced bread. "Come on," he muttered, stabbing at it with a very large knife. From the looks of the countertop, which was laid out with a jar of peanut butter and a still-sealed jar of jam, it was fairly clear that it was suppertime. Well, she'd have to talk to him sooner or later. She cleared her throat.

The tip of the knife dug a furrow in the countertop. "Don't _do_ that," Eddie sighed, laying the knife down on the frozen bread as he turned around. His right hand brushed against the deep gash in the cheap formica and he absently started to play with it. "Well?"

Jackie twisted her hands together. "I...I'm sorry I yelled," she said meekly. "It wasn't your fault. Well, it wasn't _all_ your fault," she added, thinking of the scorpion decoy and the deathtrap. "I mean, you could have told me certain things."

"Yes, I could have," he agreed neutrally. A little chip of formica_ pinged_ into the sink.

"And...and I thought about it, and...well, I can't really go back to what I did before, so I guess I have to stay with you."

"I'm flattered that you're so excited," he said with a raised eyebrow before turning back to the bread.

"I didn't mean...oh, hell, Eddie, it's been a long day and I've never done this before," Jackie sighed, running one hand through her hair. "I didn't mean for any of this to happen!"

"Life rarely turns out the way we mean it to," he said softly.

_Isn't that the truth_, Jackie thought sadly. Oh, well. "What I'm trying to say is that I'll be your...your henchgirl, if you'll still have me."

A slow, satisfied grin spread itself across Eddie's face. "Welcome aboard...Query."

(_to be continued_)

* * *

_Author's Note: I lied. People convicted of attempted murder actually get out after about seven years, at least in New York State. _

_Now, normally the next update would be on Monday. But since Monday is Christmas Eve, and since I'll be the teensiest bit busy what with the visiting and the family interaction and such, chapter four is going to go up on Thursday instead. Even silly authors need a vacation sometimes. See you next week!_


	4. Goldilocks

Jackie posed thoughtfully in front of the mirror, examining the fit of the secondhand henchgirl outfit. Much like the last ten, it was a little too tight in the tummy and a little too loose everywhere else. She sighed, wriggled out of it, and threw it on the reject pile in the bathtub.

The Riddler went through henchgirls like other rogues went through ammunition. Most of the time, the girls didn't meet his exacting standards and never made the cut to get called back for a second heist. Sometimes, like his last three, they were such raving idiots that he'd purposefully left them for the Batman in order to be rid of them.

He kept a costume trunk full of outfits in every size - well, every typical _henchgirl_ size - in his lairs to deal with the constant influx of new employees. Jackie had dragged it into the bathroom in order to find something that fit her. She still couldn't believe she was doing this. She was a little geek girl, for heaven's sake, not some kind of over-muscled minion! But things had been said and done that couldn't be taken back now, and like it or not, she was a henchgirl.

Still, it wasn't all bad. In the two days since the heist, Jackie had slowly started to accustom herself to her new role like a turn-of-the-century woman strapping herself into her first corset. It was uncomfortable and unfamiliar but she was certain that she'd get the hang of it sooner or later. (This was helped along by the stubborn little spark of optimism that flitted around in her mind like a deranged firefly. Everything would turn out all right because...well...because it _would_.)

_Always look on the bright side of life_, she told herself firmly as she tugged the bottom hem of the leotard a little farther down her hips. _And in this case, the bright side is_..._hmm_...Well, now she didn't have to look for an apartment anymore. In fact, now she had at least six apartments, if you counted abandoned toy stores and the occasional gutted warehouse as residences. The lair they'd moved into the day after the heist even had windows! She didn't have to worry about making deadlines at work, either, or dealing with that creepy guy on video conferences who was obviously more interested in her cleavage than her coding. And she did kind of look good in green...

And at least she was the Riddler's henchgirl. She couldn't really see herself in clown makeup, or burlap, or a frilly, fluffy pinafore (Jervis was a sweet little man, but the thought of living in Wonderland every waking moment was not an attractive one). Besides, Eddie was charming, and fun, and...

And thinking about Eddie was not accomplishing anything useful. She sighed. She hated leotards. She stripped it off and dug through the pile, looking for something a little more modest. (Of course, _modest_ was a relative term when discussing henchgirl outfits. If it wasn't low-cut, it was skintight, and most of them were both.)

Vivid magenta. Ew. Deep violet, not bad, but it had so many holes in it that the scraps of ancient spandex disintegrated in her hands. Black leather..._black leather_? She pinched the garment between her fingers and held it up to the light. This one was nothing but straps and chains and looked like it belonged in _S&M Monthly_.

_What kind of person would rob a place wearing a thong with a zipper_? Jackie thought in horror. _Why would you ever need a zipper in a thong, anyway?_ Clearly Gotham's nightlife was more complicated than she'd thought. She tossed the thing into the corner and returned to the trunk.

Ah, now _this_ had potential...a green question-marked minidress. She wrestled herself into it and zipped it up. Well, not bad...not _good_, either, but it would do for the moment.

There was a weird thumping noise in the living room. Jackie poked her head out of the bathroom. "Eddie?" she called.

"Busy," he replied from the bedroom.

He'd been cerebellum-deep in riddles all day. She decided to investigate without him. It was probably just another rogue looking for something or someone. After all, Batman didn't knock.

She eased into the main room and peered cautiously at the door. Well, someone was out there, all right...she could hear rustling from the doorstep. Jackie decided to retreat back into the bathroom until they went away. (She still hadn't quite recovered from the Scarecrow/Hatter pas de deux of death that had taken place in the last lair, and so was understandably cautious about letting anyone else in).

"It can't be _that_ hard," a whispered voice from outside hissed.

"Well, then _you_ try it," another voice snapped back.

"Screw the locks. Stand back," a third voice growled.

"Eddie?" Jackie called nervously.

_Crack! _A shining wedge of metal that looked amazingly like an ax blade ripped through the door. This was, of course, because it _was_ an ax blade.

"_Eddie!_" Jackie shrieked.

"I'm _busy_!"

The door burst open, revealing three women. All three were dressed in vivid green leotards. One was holding an axe, one was holding a gun, and one was holding a wickedly sharp knife. Their expressions shifted from surprise to menace as they noticed Jackie frozen in the middle of the room. "Where is he?" the one with the gun growled.

"Hey, it's that girl from the opera! And she's in your dress!" the one with the knife told the one with the axe.

"Not for long," the one with the axe growled, hefting it and taking a slow, angry step toward Jackie.

"Now listen," Jackie stammered, "I don't know who you are-"

"We're the Riddler's henchgirls," the one with the knife snapped. "I'm Quiz."

"I'm Question," volunteered the one with the gun.

"I'm Query," the one with the axe snarled.

"I'm _delighted_ to meet you," Jackie lied, slowly backing away. "There's obviously been some sort of misunderstanding-"

"We're gonna take care of it," Query promised grimly, shifting her grip on the axe.

"Listen, I'm his new henchgirl, so we can all work togeth-_erk_!" Jackie gasped as Query abandoned the axe in favor of getting a choke hold on her neck. The axe thunked heavily into the floorboards, not that Jackie noticed, because being strangled tends to occupy one's full attention.

"We were here _first_," Query growled, shaking her like a bowl of Jello. "You got that, sweetheart? Hit the road."

Jackie would have fervently agreed and sworn never to cross their paths again if she'd been able to, but her teeth were clacking together and she was starting to lose consciousness. "L-l-l-let g-g-go of m-m-m-me!"

"No," Query said icily. "Get out of my dress and hit the road. He's _ours_."

Fear was a very close cousin to anger, which incidentally might explain why Batman got all punch-happy when the Scarecrow gassed him. Her fear of imminent death was rapidly being overtaken by a quickly-deepening anger with the whole situation. Wasn't it bad enough that Batman and the cops were after her? Did the rogues have to turn on her too? Especially these three, who Eddie had most recently described as being about as smart as the average toaster. Besides, it wasn't as if being mad could make the situation any worse. "He's n-n-n-not yours," she juddered as Query bobbled her back and forth. "He's n-n-not an-anyone's!"

"Well, he sure as hell isn't _yours_," Query snarled with one final shake. "Why would he want _you_ when he could have all of _this_?" She gestured at herself and her two partners as they struck a pose.

Jackie's eyes narrowed. He could have had all of that. Instead, he'd done his best to leave all of _this_ behind in the nearest ambulance. If that didn't convince them that he wasn't interested, what would? Maybe it was the oxygen deprivation, maybe it was the anger rising in her eyes, or maybe it was all due to her overwhelming frustration with everything that had happened to her since the Riddler invited himself to dinner. Whatever was driving her now, it was pushing her right into the realm of Really Bad Ideas.

"All of what?" she asked scornfully. "All I see is a trio of idiots who can't even manage to pull off a heist without ramming directly into Batman. Not even smart enough to get in without an axe, are you?" she went on over the trio's growing snarls. "Riddle me this, _sweetheart_, what use does the Riddler have for someone who can't even work his front door?"

From halfway across the room, Question leveled the gun at Jackie's head and pulled the trigger. Fortunately for Jackie, the girls hadn't had much if any serious arms training, and the shot went past her head and into the kitchen, where it drilled through all three boxes of cereal on the top of the refrigerator before pinging noisily into an exposed pipe. Water began fountaining merrily onto the tiles.

There was a roar of frustration from the bedroom. "I thought I told you I wanted it _quiet_! I almost had it that time!" the Riddler snarled, stalking out of the back hallway and sticking his head into the bathroom. "Query?" he bellowed, when Jackie was nowhere to be found among the scattered outfits.

"What?" snapped the two women in the living room that were currently answering to that name. Eddie slowly revolved in place, eyes wide. "Oh. Hi," he said lamely, taking in the shattered door, the cereal-and-water covered kitchen and the axe quivering in the floorboards.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder. In this case, absence (and a lack of male attention) had made Query, Quiz, and Question open to the squirming little tendrils of obsessive affection that had seized so many other henchgirls in their grip.

"Eddiekins!" Quiz squealed, dropping her weapon and bounding to his side.

"Riddlybits!" Question squealed, doing likewise.

"Leave some for me!" Query said, dropping Jackie like a piece of trash and scooting over to Eddie. The three girls wrapped themselves around him, hugging and fondling him and cooing sweet nothings into his ear at top volume.

Jackie took a moment to lean on the wall and catch her breath. When she eventually looked up, the Riddler had been totally enveloped in loving henchgirls. "Get off-mmmph...get off of...get your hands _off_..." he was muttering as he tried to control six wandering hands at once.

"But Nygmuffins, we _missed_ you..."

"Every _bit_ of you..."

"Hey!" Eddie yelped as one of them started unbuttoning his shirt. He thrashed, trying to get them to let him go, and instead toppled the whole quartet down onto the floor. Jackie took this moment of their distraction to subtly kick all the weapons underneath the furniture. She wasn't about to get involved in this particular kind of struggle, though it was going to be awfully fun to tease him about it later. Presuming that the trio of Qs let her live, of course.

* * *

Like most teenage boys, Edward Nygma had daydreamed about having a girl that would love and cuddle him as well as perhaps engaging in a certain set of baseball-related euphemistic behaviors with him. If you were to tell his teenage self that someday he'd be adoringly pounced upon by three curvaceous women, he would have laughed in your face.

If you were to then tell him that his top concern would be getting them as far away from himself as possible, he probably would have punched you, or at the very least sidled away making the "let's not scare the crazy person" face that he would eventually grow to be the recipient of several hundred times over.

It was like being attacked by an octopus! No matter which way he twisted, there was always some girl there. Someone was loosening his tie. He jerked his head away, only to feel a hand trace its way down his shirt front. As it neared the front of his trousers, he slapped it away as if it were the most deadly of tarantulas. This was _ridiculous_!

"You should have come to get us like we asked," Question said, dotting his face and neck with kisses. "We could have been doing this _weeks_ ago-"

"Why didn't you come get us, sweetie?" Quiz interrupted when Question had her mouth full of Eddie's neck.

"When did you ever ask for me to come and get you?" Eddie asked, yanking Question's head away before she left him permanently marked.

"We left you all sorts of riddles," Query pouted from where she was tousling his hair.

"You got them, didn't you?" Quiz asked with big doe eyes.

"Those were _yours_?!" Eddie screeched. With the superhuman strength granted to those experiencing primal fury, he surged to his feet. The trio crumpled into individual heaps as he spun to face them. "You left those _abominations_ all over the city in _my_ colors-"

"Of course, your colors!" Question said. "We're your girls, aren't we?"

"What did they mean?" Jackie asked from a relatively safe spot by the door, interrupting Eddie before he laid out in a lethal tirade just exactly what were the reasons that they were not his girls anymore.

"You were too dumb to figure them out?" Question sneered.

"Sure," Jackie agreed, following the most sound path of logic available at the moment: never argue with anyone willing to shoot you in the head. "What did they mean?"

"Well, mine went _He walks with a cane and we want in, we want to be where Fry calls kin_," Question said proudly. "He walks with a cane - well, Dr. House on TV has a cane. House, in, we want in the house, get it?" Eddie's lips tightened. Question didn't notice. "We want to be where Fry calls kin - well, there's that episode of Futurama where Leela says Fry calls everyone 'homes'. We want to be home."

"How the hell was anyone supposed to answer that?!" Eddie screamed. "You can't base a riddle on one line of a...of a _cartoon_ that's not even on the air anymore!"

"They're making movies," Question informed him, hurt.

"I don't care!"

"Mine was _The last pig wants the wolf_," Quiz volunteered. "Y'know, 'This Little Piggy'...the last one went weeweewee all the way _home_! And the wolf blew the pig's house down, which meant that we wanted dear Eddiekins to blow up the jail to get us out."

Dear Eddiekins was foaming at the mouth. "You...you..." he sputtered, pointing a shaking finger at the trio.

"We would have been here sooner, but we didn't know where you were. We've been all over the place."

"We didn't know you had so many lairs, Eddiekins," cooed Question.

"It was lucky that they put us in the same wing as Paula, or we'd never have found you," Quiz finished happily.

Paula. Eddie clapped a hand over his eyes. Paula had been Query back when he had originally set up most of his lairs. "How many did you find?" he choked out.

"Oh, lots," Question smiled.

"This was the last one on the list."

So now he could safely assume that the trio had smashed their way into every single lair that he owned. We have met the enemy, and he is us.

He summoned up every shred and scrap of patience that he still possessed. When he put his hand down, it revealed a face that was a mask of tranquility. "How did you put all those riddles up from prison?" Eddie demanded in a voice that was still obviously trembling on a knife-edge of lethal annoyance.

"Well, we told them to Paula, and she told Liz, and Liz took care of the rest of it," Question said happily.

Liz had been Quiz for only a few short weeks. While she had been brilliant at hacking computers, she'd been somewhat less brilliant at avoiding the Batman and keeping her mouth shut about the location of the things that had "mysteriously" disappeared from the museum, and she'd gone the way of all the rest.

But, of course, Liz's involvement raised more questions. Liz was on parole. She could have found him - after all, Paula could have told her where to go - and she could have just told him, plain and simple, that the girls wanted out of prison. And then he'd have laughed in her face and told her to tell them to go to hell instead.

"If you had Liz do all that," Eddie said slowly, trying to keep a firm rein on his temper, "then why the hell didn't you just have her come and _tell_ me that you wanted out of jail?"

Quiz pouted. "We thought you'd like it this way."

Oh, yes. He _adored_ having his name dragged through the mud of mediocrity. He absolutely _loved_ having the entire city think that he was several sandwiches short of a picnic.

He had to get them out of there. "Okay, girls. You're going to go to Carlos - you remember him, right?" he added.

"Sure! He bought us those guns!"

"You're going to go to Carlos and tell him that I want my doors fixed, okay?" Eddie said. "And then you're going to go pick up dinner."

"What about _her_?" Question asked venemously, pointing a long manicured finger at Jackie.

Eddie managed to force a smile onto his face. "Well, I hardly need her anymore, right? So she'll go back home."

"We could just kill her," Quiz suggested brightly.

"I don't kill my henchgirls," Eddie replied firmly, wishing that he did. He had three prime candidates in mind for the honor. "Go on. Carlos will only be home for another few minutes." The trio scrambled to their feet and saluted him.

"We'll be back soon, Nygmy-pie!"

Eddie closed his eyes, pressed his lips tight, and stood statue-still for a few trembling minutes. "Are they gone?" he finally asked.

"Yeah," Jackie said.

"_AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAaaaaaaaargh !_" Eddie howled.

"Hey, at least they didn't try to shoot _you_ in the head," Jackie muttered.

"They tried to _shoot_ you?"

"In the head. I think I said that already," she giggled, on the verge of hysteria.

"Get your stuff," Eddie snapped as he retreated into his bedroom. "Now."

"You're really kicking me out?"

Eddie poked his head out from behind his door. "Don't be stupid. If you think for one moment that we're sticking around until they come back, you're crazier than they are."

"I don't think that's possible," Jackie said, stuffing the few bits of clothing she had into a bag with her laptop. "Where are we going?"

"A little place I know."

(_to be continued_)

_Author's Note: Poor adored Eddie. We should all have his problems. (Oh, and also? 'Nygmy-pie' is possibly the worst pet name for Eddie that I've ever heard...and I invented it. I'm sorry, Eddie.) The episode of Futurama that was referenced is "Roswell that Ends Well" (Leela: Fry's from around this time. I'll talk like him. Yo, homes!) and though I've never seen House, I hear it's snarktacular fun. The thong with the zipper is taken right out of Eddie's origin story in the Detective Comics 1995 annual...y'know, the one where Query and Echo break down Eddie's door with an axe. Ah, canon, where would we be without you?_

_Additional 01/25/13: I've never been happy with this chapter, so I finally broke down and changed a bunch of it. I think it's much better this way. _


	5. When The Moon Hits Your Eye

"When you said that you knew this place," Jackie said uneasily, "how well did you mean?"

"No one ever comes here, particularly _these_ rooms," Eddie answered as he slumped into what could conceivably be called a chair with a little imagination. "And there are no windows, so it's safer than most other hotels."

"Safe. Great," Jackie muttered. "And _they_ don't know about this place?"

Eddie shook his head. "I've only ever been here alone."

Jackie could see why. It wasn't exactly a place that you'd bring anyone, unless you felt like dying of embarrassment later.

This place - the Gotham Civic - was just an ordinary hotel from the outside. And indeed, if you were fortunate enough to get a room on the top few floors, it was certainly livable enough.

Jackie and the Riddler, however, had gotten a room on the ground floor. Now, most ground-floor rooms are unwanted for normal reasons - passersby dragging rattly luggage, elevators dinging, hotel staff chattering merrily to one another at three in the morning. These rooms were...well, the kind word would be _different_.

Theme rooms. The main hallway boasted at least thirty of the things, each decorated in a different style that was as overblown as a typical rogue's lair. There was a jungle room stuffed with a bamboo tent and a huge fake tiger growling at the bed. There was a polar room with the bed tucked nicely inside a gigantic fiberglass igloo. There was a room called Cupid's Fantasy which both of them flatly refused to discuss after one glimpse inside.

They had finally chosen the Moon Room, if only because it was the one with the most space and the least annoying decorations. (The concrete tree supporting the bed in the Sherwood Forest room was at perfect forehead-whacking height, for one, and Jackie couldn't stop laughing at the glass-slipper-shaped hot tub in the Cinderella room.)

If you were into rough grey stones, the Moon Room was paradise. If, however, you preferred to brush by corners and not get your legs scratched open, you were out of luck. The walls from knee-height down were coated in fake grey rock that jutted out like a miniature shelf. The upper bit was painted black and speckled with 'stars' that glowed in the dark. 'Chairs' made of the same rockstuff as the lower walls were attached to the wall in various spots, mostly around a somewhat anachronistic rabbit-eared TV. A suspiciously sticky hot tub lurked in one darkened corner, and a round bed inside a spaceship crouched opposite it. Jackie poked her head inside to look around. It had a tape deck recessed into it - how futuristic - and a set of speakers were perched on the walls. Jackie followed the wires up to the ceiling, where they disappeared under a dingy mirror the exact size and shape of the bed below it.

She ducked back out of the spaceship. "And you're _sure_ you were here alone?" she asked incredulously.

Eddie's face went bright red. "Look, I know it's..." He waved his hands helplessly, unable to think of a suitable description of the place. "But it's cheap and it's safe."

* * *

The room was cheap, and it was safe. Eddie had been absolutely correct. 

However, it was also boring. Very boring. Oh, it was fine enough for Eddie - his brain was possibly the best entertainment device he would ever own, and long hours inside Arkham's bare little cells had trained him in the fine art of living inside the boundaries of his mind. In fact, Eddie was actually enjoying himself far more than he had anticipated, since the hotel supplied free notepads for him to scribble ideas onto. He'd filled up at least fifty of them by now, and the thin ink-covered booklets lay in haphazard piles on the tiny table.

Jackie, however, was quickly running out of things to do. The laptop had terminally clicked off halfway through her five thousand and sixty-fifth game of Solitaire. The television picked up one channel - Gotham Public Television - and they only ever showed children's programming. What happened to nature documentaries? What had happened to Nova and the Joy of Painting? She'd _liked_ Bob Ross and his happy little trees. Bob the Builder could go suck a goat, in her opinion, and the entire cast of the "new and improved" Sesame Street was more than welcome to join him. _'Cookies are a sometimes food', indeed_!

She was currently edging around the room on the little rock 'shelf' that hugged the walls. It was harder than it looked, particularly since there were no good handholds on the smooth painted wall. The rough stones prickled on the bare skin of her feet as she rounded the corner.

There was a tricky bit coming up where the rock had been bashed and chipped at through the years. It was unstable and tended to pop uneasily as she maneuvered across it. She grimaced at Eddie in his chair right next to the faulty section. It would serve him right if she landed on his head, she thought angrily as she got closer. It was all his fault that they had to be here, anyway.

The rock snapped and gave way under her toes. She yelped and scraped frantically at the walls. Eddie, without looking up from his newest notepad, gently shoved her back into position. "Having fun?" he asked absently.

"No," she growled, stomping down to the ground. There was still nothing to_ do_! With a deep, heartfelt sigh, she started climbing the round spaceship. Ten minutes and several bruises later, she lay atop it, glaring bitterly across the room at Eddie.

"What?" he asked, still not looking up.

"I'm_ bored_," she sighed, unable to keep a rising whine out of her voice. "Why are we still here?"

"Those three lunatics know where all my lairs are," Eddie said, marking something down and underlining it, "and we need to lay low for a few weeks."

"A few _weeks_?" Jackie rolled her eyes. "You're really that scared of them?"

His pencil tip snapped. "I am not _scared_ of them," he said, glaring up at her.

"Well, you certainly ran away from them fast enough!"

"As I recall, _you_ were running pretty quickly too."

"They tried to _shoot_ me in the _head_, Edward," Jackie said patiently. "The worst thing they did to _you_ was give you sloppy kisses."

"I'd rather have them shoot me in the head," he grumbled. "Anyway, we're not just hiding from them. The Batman will be looking for us, and now is not the best time to move into a new hideout. We'll wait until he's likely to be distracted and go then."

"Oh, and how are we supposed to know that?"

"There's a rhythm to these things," Eddie explained, ticking off points on his fingers. "Harvey tends to be most active on the second and the twenty-second. Pam - Poison Ivy, that is - generally waits until the springtime to start any major activities that involve growing plants outside of her greenhouses. And there's always the holidays - Crane hasn't missed a Halloween in...hmm, must be ten years at least-"

"Halloween's this Friday!" Jackie interrupted, sitting up. "That would work, right?"

"No. Friday is today, pumpkin, and if we were going lair hunting we should have left five hours ago. We'd never find a place in time."

Jackie sighed exasperatedly and slumped back down onto the roof of the spaceship, picking at a bit of incised graffiti. The sound of scritching graphite told her that Eddie had found another pencil and was having yet another brainstorm. "Can we at _least_ go get dinner somewhere? By the time room service gets up to our room, the food's ice-cold and I'm sick of taco popsicles."

"Fine," Eddie muttered, scribbling away.

* * *

Eddie was somewhat surprised at dinnertime when Jackie yanked the notepad away. "I was writing!" he protested. 

"Yeah, well, now you're eating. C'mon, let's go."

"Go?"

Jackie frowned at him. "Dinner. You said we could go eat in a restaurant. You _did,_" she sighed when he looked blankly at her. "Remember? The Scarecrow is keeping Batman busy?"

Eddie did not want to leave the room. Jackie, looking mutinous, declared that she was going even if Eddie wasn't. She was halfway out into the hall before he acquiesced.

They compromised by having dinner in the hotel's little poolside restaurant. The architect had splurged on a huge glass pyramid in the roof that let the starlight sparkle down on them as they ate. The starlight had to sparkle through about twelve years of dirt, since the hotel staff had neglected to splurge on a janitor willing to clamber about on the rooftop with a squeegee.

The waitress, pink dress bulging at the seams, squinted myopically down at them. "It's good roast beef, isn't it, sweetums?" Jackie cooed nauseatingly sweetly at Eddie.

He nodded enthusiastically. "Best I've ever had, dear heart," he cooed back.

The waitress rolled her eyes and left them alone again. Eddie and Jackie hadn't left their room for a week. They'd ordered in room service and refused entry by the maid. The Gotham Civic knew _all_ about that kind of guest. It didn't matter that they'd registered under separate pseudonyms - the Gotham Civic knew all about _that_ kind of thing too. Young newlyweds, illicit lovers, star-crossed sweethearts - it didn't matter what you called it, it all added up to an overwhelming dose of lovey-dovey-ness.

Which is why they kept the silly, bemused expression of those in love firmly planted on their faces as they picked at the thoroughly unappetizing roast beef.

"This would be hard enough without having to put on this act," Jackie grumbled. "But it must be harder for you, since you don't actually like me," she added flatly, staring intently down at her plate.

Navigating the waters of relationships has always been difficult. It takes a ridiculous amount of courage to even bring the topic up in some cases - are we together? Are we, you know, _together_? Nudge nudge, wink wink, say no more? Or are we just friends? Or are we _friends_, wink wink - oh, you know.

These sorts of questions had been bubbling merrily away in the back of both of their minds ever since the morning after Jackie's birthday party. Had she been shocked and appalled to find herself in bed with _anyone_, or specifically with _him_? Had he snuggled her because she happened to be a girl sleeping at his place, or had it been specifically because it had been _her_?

Eddie had backed away from bringing it up in the week that they'd been in the hotel room. If the answer had been "No", it would have been enormously difficult to stay there. (And if the answer had been "Yes"...well, pessimism said that it probably wouldn't, so why ask?) At any rate, going to Jackie and baldfacedly asking if she liked him felt too much like a return to his high school days. He supposed that there were ways that a man could ask That Question of a woman without totally losing his dignity and pride, but Eddie had never learned them. No, he would sit back and wait for her to make a move.

Well, now she had. Unfortunately, she was moving in entirely the wrong direction. "W-what?"

"We've been here for a week and you've barely looked at me. I know I'm not a genius like you, but I didn't think I was _that_ bad."

Eddie flailed internally for something to say. Ever since the heist, Jackie had been...well..._moody_ would be an understatement. She had been angry, or sad, or bitter, or some strange combination of the three that only a girl could pull off successfully. Frankly, he'd left her alone because he'd been tired of getting blamed for something he hadn't done. Again.

He bit the inside of his lip. He was supposed to be a brilliant wordsmith - hell, he spent his entire career playing with words - so why couldn't he think of a single thing to say?

"Ah..." he stammered, looking uncomfortably at the big fake waterfall in the corner. "That is, um..."

Jackie remained silent, watching him cautiously through lowered lashes.

"Look, I...I certainly like you more than _those_ three," he pointed out desperately.

Jackie rolled her eyes. "You like the _Mad Hatter_ more than you like those three," she pointed out.

"True. Okay. Uh, look, _darling_," he said quickly as a waitress loomed up behind Jackie, "do we want dessert?"

"Sure thing, snugglebunny," she cooed, saccharinely sweet. He winced inwardly.

"Dessert menus, please, Betty," he said as charmingly as possible to the waitress. She snorted derisively at him and waddled back toward the host station to fetch them.

"_Darling_?" Jackie hissed at him. "What are we, in the 1950's?"

"Well, what am I supposed to call you?" Eddie hissed back. "_Snugglebunny_?"

"That one's mine," she said. "Get your own sickeningly sweet nickname."

"How about my little question-marked enchantress of the-_hnnnngh_!" He hadn't been kicked in that particular area in quite some time. Jackie, with a look of fake sympathy plastered on her face, chirruped "Are you okay, _snugglebunny_? Tummy not feeling well?"

"I'm fine," Eddie wheezed. She had excellent aim. He'd have to remember that for the future.

The waitress, eyeing them suspiciously, passed over the dessert menus. They waited until she was out of earshot to open their mouths again. "I vote that we skip dessert," Eddie grumbled, shifting very carefully backward in his chair.

"I had to shut you up somehow!" Jackie whispered. "Question-marked enchantress. What were you _thinking_? She almost heard you!"

Rather than answer, he buried his face in the dessert menu. Long minutes ticked past as he examined each dessert in minute detail. Well, so much for any hope of salvaging the situation. Why hadn't he just said...well, he could have said _something_...oh, the hell with it. He tossed the menu to the table and glared at the waterfall.

The uncomfortable silence lay over the table like a dead hippopotamus. Jackie burrowed in her purse for something and seemed to be taking an awfully long time about it. Finally, as Eddie was about to call it quits and go back to the room, a shadow fell over the table.

"I'll have the..." Eddie trailed off. Instead of a middle-aged fat woman in a pink dress, a rather too muscular young man in a black spandex suit with one blue stripe was glaring down at him. "Query," he hissed across the table.

"Don't call me that," she snapped. He kicked her leg. "Ow!" she yelped, finally looking up from her purse. "Why did you...oh."

Nightwing seized each of them by a wrist and dragged them upright. With a move that somewhat resembled a conductor cutting off a song, he twisted their arms neatly behind their backs and propelled them away from the table. "I thought you said they'd be busy with the Scarecrow!" Jackie yelped at Eddie, dancing along on tiptoe to keep her shoulder from snapping out of its socket.

"They normally are! Don't tell me he actually skipped Halloween!" Eddie said incredulously to Nightwing as he shoved them toward the door. The waitress, leaning on her hostess stand, glared at them as they stumbled by.

"Oh, Batman picked _him_ up two hours ago," Nightwing informed the Riddler with a cheerful smile on his face.

Eddie looked frantically around the lobby. He needed to buy some time. _Keep him talking. When he's talking, he doesn't pay as much attention to what you're doing. _"So he didn't try to run all over the city this time?"

"It's hard to run with a lungful of fear gas," Nightwing said smugly.

They were almost to the main double doors, which were propped open to let the cool fall breeze in. It was now or never. Eddie kicked up a foot and planted it firmly on the middle of the right-hand door. With a mighty heave, he slammed backward into Nightwing and sent the trio sprawling.

Nightwing reflexively let them go and tumbled backward, smashing hard into a replica suit of armor. It snapped off at the ankles and smacked down on him, spilling armor parts all over the tile floor. Nightwing snarled and started to get to his feet. A dented cuirass clattered to the floor.

He was going to get one of them. It was a certainty. But it was also a certainty that he couldn't get _both_ of them, particularly if someone were to take this moment to run out the door at speeds approaching that of a panicked cheetah.

It was him or her.

Really, the decision was almost _too_ easy

* * *

The heavily armored van that served as a transport from the main police station out to Arkham was exceptionally full that night. The narrow benches were barely big enough to hold Batman's catch of the day. 

Two-Face had taken the seat farthest into the vehicle so that he could lean against the wall with his left side while cradling his right arm protectively. Demonica, mostly unhurt, took the seat next to him, fussing over his injured shoulder like a mother hen despite his protestations.

The entire right bench belonged to Angelica and a pair of guards. She sat hunched between them, moaning pitifully. A large, nasty swelling on her head peeped from between her fingers. As the car lurched over the cracked asphalt, she groaned and yelped "Gonna throw up!" The guards inched as far away as possible from the wretched girl.

And in the darkness, crammed into the remaining corner of the van, the Riddler sighed as a fear-crazed Scarecrow kicked him again in the shins. "Will you _stop it_?" he hissed, trying to shove him closer to Demonica.

Well, it had been the obvious choice, hadn't it? He knew how to pick locks, he knew Arkham's layout, he knew when the guards were less attentive...really, if he'd let Jackie go to Arkham, she'd be in there until he managed to break in and get her back out. And breaking_ into_ Arkham was even more of a hassle than breaking out. No, this way he could stay just long enough for them to stop watching him and then be out the door.

And if the Bats managed to catch up with Jackie in the meantime, well, then they could break out _together_. Eddie's half-formed daydreams were rudely interrupted when the Scarecrow's straitjacketed elbow slammed into his ribs. "Get away, get away," Crane mumbled, feet twitching as if he was sprinting down the streets away from his hallucinated horrors.

The Riddler rested the back of his head against the wall and closed his eyes. Well, at any rate, they'd ended that intensely awkward conversation on a high note. After all, what better way to say 'I like you' than with the gift of not going to Arkham?

* * *

_Author's Note: Oh, yes, the hotel actually does exist, though it's nowhere like Gotham. The slipper-shaped hot tub is a thing of hilarity. And Cupid's Fantasy?...ewwwwwww. _

_For more information on Jonathan and Harvey's night out, see my story "Grim Grinning Ghosts". (Yaharr! Continuity be a harsh mistress, mateys.)_

_Regarding these Eddie and Jackie stories - I am having a total blast writing them. I'm glad you're all enjoying them as much as I am. There's one problem, though - this isn't where they started. Dear little Eddiekins (why am I _still calling him that_?!) and Jackie first appeared in a series that I never posted. (In other words, you've been reading a retcon this whole time!) And frankly, trying to write one story without showing you the other is twisting my brain into little tiny knots. _

_In short, I'll be posting this new (old) story soon. It's not exactly the same type of silliness as in the stories I've recently posted - it's more like a shell of humor wrapped around an angsty nougat center - but I've been told that it's a lot of fun, nonetheless. And then I can start making all the deliciously silly jokes that I've been dying to make for months!_

_I have quite a few ideas for the future of Eddie and Jackie, but other rogues are fighting me for their turn in the spotlight, so...Tune in next time for "Time Crisis" in the Cartoons/Batman Animated section of this website. (I'll give you two guesses as to who the main villain in _that_ one is.) _


End file.
